Global Environments through the Quaternary

Exploring Evironmental Change

David Anderson, Andrew Goudie, and Adrian Parker

Unrivalled coverage of the entire Quaternary period enables the reader to build a balanced view of the patterns and cycles driving environmental change over millions of years.

Draws upon examples from a range of geographical locations, encouraging the reader to view environmental change on a broad, global scale.

Brings together discussions of the physical basis of environmental change and the human activities that have influenced this change, giving the reader a truly integrated view of both processes and impacts.

Explores environmental change in the context of sea level and climate change, demonstrating the immediate relevance of the subject to contemporary study and research.

An Online Resource Centre features additional resources for both lecturers and students, enhancing the educational value of the text.

Topics surrounding climate change over various timescales, such as the Cainozoic cooling trend, and orbital forcing, have been expanded and updated, and more background is given on the different systems and notations used to distinguish timescales and chronologies.

More depth is provided on research methods, including palaeoecological transfer functions, dating techniques, stable isotope geochemistry, and environmental modelling.

Sections on short-term climate oscillations, future climate trends, and the relationship between human evolution and environmental change have been enhanced with an emphasis on highlighting the relevance of the Quaternary record to current issues.

New review questions have been added to the end of chapters to aid learning and allow readers to check their understanding.

Global Environments through the Quaternary

Exploring Evironmental Change

Second Edition

David Anderson, Andrew Goudie, and Adrian Parker

Description

We are in the grip of global warming: sea levels are rising; glaciers are melting, Arctic sea ice is thinning, meteorological events are becoming more extreme. But how do these changes compare with the environmental changes that have occurred in the past? How can they be put into perspective? What can we learn from the past to help us better understand how natural and human factors may interact to change our climate and environment in the future?

Global Environments through the Quaternary delves into the environmental changes that have taken place during the Quaternary: the last 2.6 million years of geological history and time during which humans have evolved and spread across the Earth. Taking the reader through the Pleistocene and the Holocene, the book describes the evidence that has helped us to characterize environmental changes during these two epochs; it then explores the changes captured by more recent meteorological records in the period up to the present day. Throughout, it aims to convey the relevance of paleoenvironmental and paleoclimatic studies to current environmental and climatic concerns. Climate change research foretells of potentially catastrophic consequences in the future and, even now, early indicators of those changes are evident in the retreating Greenland ice sheet, melting permafrost, changes in fish distributions in northern waters, and more besides. The book examines changes to the physical environment throughout the Quaternary, putting current concerns into perspective, and closes with a discussion of the causes of climatic and environmental change over different timescales - and the complex interactions between human impacts and natural processes.

With climate change - itself but part of the perpetual process of environmental change - as important a topic of debate now as at any other time, Global Environments through the Quaternary is essential reading for any student seeking a balanced, objective overview of this truly interdisciplinary subject.

Previous publication dates

Global Environments through the Quaternary

Exploring Evironmental Change

Second Edition

David Anderson, Andrew Goudie, and Adrian Parker

Table of Contents

1. A framework for understanding environmental change2. Sources of evidence for reconstructing past environments3. Pleistocene climatic change and environments of mid- to high latitudes4. Pleistocene environments of lower latitudes5. Environmental change in post-glacial times6. Sea-level changes of the Quaternary7. Environmental change during the period of meteorological records8. Links between environmental change and human evolution and society9. The causes of climatic change